A new international study led by scientists from the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies (IMAS) and the University’s Centre for Marine Socioecology (CMS) has highlighted how humans are being affected by climate-driven changes in the distribution of land, marine and freshwater species around the world.

Global ecological changes pose a wide range of emerging challenges for humans, from health risks to economic threats, and from conflict over fisheries resources to impacts on the supply of coffee.

Published in the journal Science and led by IMAS Associate Professor Gretta Pecl, the study by a large international team of scientists warns that communities and economies from the tropics to the poles are being affected as species are already responding to climate change.

Human survival depends on other life on earth so the redistribution of the planet’s living organisms is a substantial challenge for people worldwide, Associate Professor Pecl said.

Scientists have devised a new tool that can estimate commercial fish species to determine their sensitivity to climate change.

It is ready for use and is providing knowledge on different fish in a range of global oceanic “hotspots” including south-east Australia.

Australian scientists led by Associate Professor Gretta Pecl at the University of Tasmania’s Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies have put together the assessment and it has already been adapted and applied by Canadian and US authorities.

Associate Professor Pecl said hotspots – where temperatures are increasing much faster than the global average – have been identified in all oceans, including waters around India, Madagascar and South Africa in the Indian Ocean; Canada, Alaska and Japan in the Pacific Ocean; Brazil in the Atlantic Ocean; and elsewhere from polar to tropical regions.